


Flint and Steel

by kageygirl



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: F/M, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-03-06
Updated: 2006-03-06
Packaged: 2017-10-19 18:01:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,776
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/203697
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kageygirl/pseuds/kageygirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Keep rubbing a pair of wooden sticks together, and something is bound to kindle...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Flint and Steel

**Author's Note:**

> For the [For the Free Your Mind: Slashers Write Het Challenge](http://lostcityfound.livejournal.com/tag/free%20your%20mind) at [lostcityfound](http://lostcityfound.livejournal.com/).

"Mother _fucker_ ," Lorne said, when he hit the mat.

Hard.

Again.

Then he glanced up at Teyla, the one who kept putting him there, and grimaced. "Sorry."

Teyla gave him a mild look in return. Wisps of hair escaped from her ponytail accented her cheeks like copper filigree. That, and a light sheen of sweat were the only breaks in her composure, and the perspiration just showed off her toned muscles. "I am still no more offended than the last time," she said, with a wry twist to her mouth. _Or the time before that_ , Lorne figured, though he didn't guess she was actually counting.

Of course, she wasn't the one who needed to count, because it was his ass that kept meeting up with the mat.

"Force of habit," he said, picking himself up with a winded chuckle and trying to make it look easy. And if not easy, at least not too painful. "Back on Earth, it's considered rude to curse in front of a lady."

"Except under extreme duress, I assume," she said, with a tilt of her head and a challenging smile, and now she _had_ to be laughing at him. He reminded himself that she'd been pounding on a bunch of Marines for a year before he even got to the galaxy. By now, she probably knew her way around both the Earth male ego and some pretty inventive profanity.

"Well, it's more likely to happen then, but it's still considered rude, so we still apologize for it." Lorne grinned back at her and adjusted his grip on the fighting sticks. His fingers were going numb from having the damn things smacked out of his hands so often, but he wasn't ready to throw in the towel yet.

Teyla bowed her head without taking her eyes off him. When he got back into the ready stance, she started circling him, and he turned to follow her, still having to think about his footwork. "I assure you, there is no need to apologize." Silly alien customs, her eyes seemed to say, even as she looked him over for weak spots. "Though I do appreciate the compliment."

Lorne raised his eyebrows, and Teyla tilted her head as she clarified, still stalking him like a hungry tiger. "That you consider me a lady. It is to be taken as a compliment, is it not?"

"It certainly is, ma'am. Even when you're kicking my ass." He nodded at her, giving her his most sincere expression. "In fact, especially when you're kicking my ass."

Teyla's mouth twitched, and she slowed her stride for maybe just a second. It was the opening he'd been hoping for, and Lorne moved on it, lunging forward to sweep her lower stick wide and away as he went for her knees.

At least, that's what he'd been planning to do. But her distraction was a feint, of course, and after a short, furious exchange of hits, he ended up with his sticks clattering against the far wall, down on one knee, his right thigh throbbing like a son of a bitch.

She'd pulled her strike high, he knew. If she hadn't, he'd have been off the mission rotation and limping, maybe permanently lame. Even so, he was going to have a big, colorful, painful reminder for a couple of days.

"How long did you say it took the colonel to pick this up?" Lorne panted, looking up at Teyla, again, as she spun her sticks in lazy, casual circles.

"You are doing very well."

He didn't miss the fact that she didn't actually answer the question. "I could be doing better," he said, and she shook her head fondly.

 _Screw it_ , he thought, going for broke. Instead of standing, he went into a forward roll, aiming for her ankle and letting momentum do the rest.

He finally caught her off guard--probably because she hadn't been expecting an attack this clumsy and awkward--and she went down on top of him.

He took an elbow to the back--that was gonna leave a mark, too--but she lost her sticks trying to avoid a hard landing, and Lorne figured he might have a shot at close-in grappling, with mass and reach and upper-body strength on his side.

Unfortunately, he figured wrong.

They both tumbled over, scrambling to get the upper hand. Teyla scissored her legs around his waist and flipped him off of her, and before he could roll away, she'd gotten him face-down, one arm twisted behind him and in a wristlock for good measure, with her knee planted in the small of his back.

"Now, tell me--where did you make your mistake?" she asked, panting, from behind and above him.

"Not wearing body armor under my sweats?"

Lorne blinked down at the mat, once more up close and personal. A drop of sweat rolled from his hairline and trailed down his cheek, tickling.

"Attacking with neither a decisive advantage nor a clear objective," she corrected him, but at least she sounded a little bit amused, too. "Though I commend you on the element of surprise."

"Sure. I'm just full of surprises." His arm was going numb. Lorne tried to wiggle his fingers and got himself a little extra pressure on his wrist for his trouble.

"Do you yield?" Teyla asked, her breath still gusting faintly across the back of his neck. Lorne would've been more proud of himself for getting her out of breath, but only the fact that he had his other palm planted against the floor kept him from having both shoulders squarely pinned.

He stifled a cough, and ground out, "Do you want me to?" His free arm was starting to tremble from the strain of keeping his shoulder up, and he wasn't too far away from getting his face mashed into the mat, but he couldn't resist.

"For now, yes," she said, and though he couldn't see her face, the laughter was clear in her voice.

"Then I totally yield." He relaxed, as much as he could without dislocating either shoulder. After a pointed, frozen moment, she let him go, gently releasing his arm.

She slid her knee away, too, slowly, drawing her foot down his inner thigh, and he sucked in a breath. She was straddling his leg, bleeding heat into him where they touched.

Lorne half-turned, but Teyla didn't move any further. He ended up propped on an elbow, with one leg still trapped between hers as she knelt over him.

It wasn't the most comfortable position ever, but he couldn't bring himself to mind it too much.

"How would you have escaped, had I not wished to release you?" Teyla was resting her hands on her own thighs, giving him a piercing look.

"I'm not entirely sure," he admitted, smiling at her in chagrin.

"You should consider the matter for the future, in case you end up here again." Teyla lifted her knee and nudged his, and Lorne finished rolling over, carefully, muscles protesting the unnatural positions he'd been putting them in. When he was on his back, he let out a sigh and dropped his head down, closing his eyes.

He snapped them open again when Teyla swung her leg back over his and settled herself down just above his knees.

This time, her hands were on _his_ thighs, and he raised his head to see her giving him an almost dirty smile. "If you keep your objective firmly fixed in your mind, you may not be forced to concede in the future."

Lorne folded his hands behind his head, making a deliberate effort to stay cool. Damn, the slits in her skirt exposed--a lot of leg. "How do you know this wasn't my objective all along?"

One of her eyebrows went up, skepticism written across her face. "Because I may appreciate your ingenuity, but I do not believe you can see the future." She leaned forward, her weight on her hands, pressing him down, and that was definitely a dirty smile. "And I have not known you to willingly put yourself at such a disadvantage, Major."

"Maybe you don't know me well enough." He drew his hands out from behind his head, cautiously, not making any sudden moves--not that they would have helped him, but he liked the way she was tracking his movements with a playful, hungry gaze. Sliding his palms over the backs of her hands and up onto her forearms, he felt the stiff, warm leather of her gauntlets, worn smooth from long use. "And maybe I don't consider this a disadvantage."

She rotated her wrists and grabbed his own, and he didn't resist as she pinned them to the mat at his sides. She leaned closer in the process, giving him quite the view. Which he guessed was on purpose, because her voice was rich with humor and--something more. "Your definition of yielding is very strange."

"I said I yielded. I didn't say I was giving up." He grinned at her quickly, then gave her a serious look, all teasing aside. "Would you prefer it if I gave up?"

She studied him for a long moment, eyebrow raised and expression enigmatic, before the corner of her mouth curved up, sly and taunting. "I... would be a very poor teacher indeed if I were to let you think your efforts had been wasted."

Lorne opened his mouth to reply, but a faint echo of voices floated in through the open door, growing louder. Teyla sat back and rose to her feet in one continuous motion, then leaned down to offer him a hand.

He let her help pull him up, mostly suppressing a groan. "So, what you're saying is--I should keep working at it."

"I am saying that you should take care in how you apply yourself." Her fingers were still wrapped around his wrists, and she gave them a squeeze before stepping back, fingers trailing along his own before they slipped away. "I may not always let you go so easily."

"That's a risk I'm willing to take," he said, and she gave him a brilliant smile, eyes warm and bright.

Lorne could hear the Marines a little too well now, joking and taunting each other as they came down the hall, and so he turned away to find his sticks as Teyla went after hers.

He had to bend down to retrieve them, and he did it gingerly, waiting for the pain, but it ended up being easier than he'd expected.

Her smile was still warming him, and his aches had melted away, like morning frost dissolved by the sun.


End file.
